


King of Spiders

by idrilswritings (idrilhadhafang)



Category: Original Work
Genre: Attempted Corrective Rape, Begins with character death, Blood and Violence, Decapitation, F/M, Heroine/Villain Romance, Original Fiction, Past Abuse, Past Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Past Attempted Sexual Abuse, Past Child Abuse, Slow Romance, Start Of Darkness
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-12
Updated: 2019-02-12
Packaged: 2019-10-26 16:15:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17749208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idrilhadhafang/pseuds/idrilswritings
Summary: Once upon a time, in the future, there lived a young man in a city full of poverty, abuse and unfairness, who decided to do something about it. Unfortunately, as the years passed, and he got used to his new title as the new King of Spiders, he let bitterness and anger get the best of him. A new heroine is stepping up to face him, but things may take a turn that neither one of them will truly expect...





	King of Spiders

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How the current King of Spiders came to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for mentions of attempted child sexual abuse/corrective rape in this chapter.

The steps down to the throne room seemed to take an eternity for Michael Poole. He held his knife in his right hand, a right hand that was missing a finger that he had lost when he was fourteen and in a fight with thugs. He continued down the hallway, his companions Harold (or Harry) Hooke and Aria Green by his side. Left. Right. Left. Right. It seemed that every step that he took seemed to take forever. His legs felt like they were made of lead, and yet he forced himself to keep walking, to keep going, no matter what.

"We're right behind you." Harry's voice was reassuring, grounding in his ear. "We promise. We've come this far, Mike. We're not going to betray you."

Michael turned to look at him. "I know." He wasn't about to back down. Not in this moment, not in this lifetime. He couldn't help but shake, at least a little bit, even as he approached the throne room. This...this had been the place of so much suffering. When he was seventeen, when that monster had tried to --

He gritted his teeth. He couldn't afford to remember such things. The best he could do was use them as fuel for when he had to fight against the bastard.

The massive doors creaked open, and on the throne, a gold contrast against a dark background, sat the King of Spiders himself, dressed in long, ornate robes that were really a testament to his greed. How he wasted the money that he owned while others like Michael starved and had to do what they could to survive. He was the sort of man who had a pale, thin face, red-haired and green eyed, and already, Michael could feel those eyes all but piercing through him. The same stare that, as a kid, would make him feel like no bigger than an ant.

Now...now he knew better. 

"I have to say I'm impressed," the King said, evenly. "I didn't exactly expect you, of all people, to make it that far."

Michael knew that he most likely looked quite the contrast. Splattered in the blood of the King's previous enforcers, covered in gunk -- then again, that was a more than common occurrence when being chased by people who wanted him dead, or wanted his things, or anything like that. An underfed-looking, dark-haired young boy of eighteen, who was now thinking that he could take on a monster and win.

Then again, maybe he could. 

"You underestimated all of us," Michael said. "You have a talent for that." A beat. "We're not here to talk with you. We're here to deliver you the justice you're due."

Silence. Then the King actually looked at him, scornfully. " _Really_?"

"Someone has to be."

"I don't know how a little freak like you could actually stand up to someone like me."

Michael could swear that he could feel the red, the familiar red, building behind his eyes, boiling. "Don't," he said, "Call me freak."

It was something that, as a little boy, stung and degraded. Now...now it just made him angry. 

"You think that you can kill me." The King stood up in one fluid motion, drawing his own staff. "You're wrong. There's many things that you can learn from combat, if you would pay attention as you do." 

Michael couldn't help but freeze. Could a knife actually work against a staff? It worked in other instances, naturally, like when you were in a street fight. But here, against the King of Spiders? 

You might as well have brought a knife to a gunfight, to paraphrase that movie from Earth that Michael had never gotten around to watching. 

Even fighting against the King was a matter of having to dodge his blows, ducking under them. Michael didn't have as impressive weapons as the King did, but he could certainly try, of course. Trying was the best you could do to survive, in the end. 

"You're pathetic," the King said. "I have to say I'm disappointed. I thought I trained you better than this, Michael."

"Is that what you call...any of this?" Michael said. "Any of what you did to me?"

"I thought I could make you stronger than you were. Instead, you were nothing more than a paragon of weakness."

Michael dodged, slashed, kicked, pulled out everything at his disposal -- including weapons that he had constructed himself -- in order to fight off the King, and Aria and Harry did their part. They didn't shoot at him, but they used their own manufactured weapons -- staffs, swords, everything. He cut at the King's hand, in desperation --

\-- and the staff fell from his hand. 

Michael caught it. He stood over the King of Spiders, who was now clutching his wounded, bleeding hand, and turned to Aria. "Ari...I'm going to need your sword. Leaving him alive is too risky. Besides, you know what we came for."

Some would call it murder. Michael called it the sort of justice that nobody else was willing to give. 

Aria didn't say anything. Just a nod. She'd brought this sword, this simple yet effective sword, specifically for that occasion.

Michael took it from her hand before turning back to the King of Spiders. He half-expected the worm to be begging for his life after everything that happened. The worm that had done so much wrong to him. To so many others. 

"Noah Anderson," Michael said. "You kneel here accused of crimes that no one should ever commit. Child abuse. Attempted rape. Torture. There are so many crimes you have committed in the name of preserving your authority as the King of Spiders that I don't even know where to begin. I cannot allow you to live."

"You...you're the judge of who lives and who dies now?" said the King. "How arrogant of you."

"Far from it. I'm merely carrying out my own form of justice -- for all the children you abused, just to begin with." Michael took a deep breath. "Leaving you alive would not only be risky, but it would be an insult to everyone who suffered under you. So...I'm here to tell you that your reign of terror is over."

"There's another. There will always be another -- " 

Michael sliced through the King's neck, and watched as the head rolled to the floor. He stood over the body of the man who had called himself the King of Spiders, breathing heavily even as he did so. He had killed before. Mostly in self-defense. He'd taken lives in the name of survival, but never in his eighteen years had he ever dreamed of doing something like this. Killing someone on purpose, out of anger...

Still, there was a cheer behind him -- Aria, shocked, delighted. "We did it!"

He supposed that that was true enough. After all, he had taken down a tyrant, effectively. He had taken down a monster. A tyrant, in fact. A man who had made his life a misery. A man who had tried to have him sold for sex, as a way to "correct" him. A man who had humiliated and put him down, starved him. A man who, now that Michael thought about it, had no redeeming qualities. Even looking at his decapitated form, Michael couldn't help but feel like he would never really be the same again. He was effectively not the same boy who had decided to go through that door. He was not the same boy who had believed in a better life. 

It was like all the anger that had decided to stay pent up for so long was now all but coursing free.

He turned towards the others. "There will be a new King of Spiders," he said. "And I know who's the one to do it."

Harry nodded. "You know that we'll follow you to the end of the earth, Mike," he said. "Guaranteed."

Even stepping past the remains of the man who had been Noah Anderson -- and it was funny thinking of him by his real name. It was like all that remained was a sad, pathetic, angry man who wanted control over everyone in sight -- Michael couldn't help but feel a strange sense of power, electric in his chest and his belly. It was something that he wasn't used to. He was used to feeling starved, pursued, thirsty, and so many things. He wasn't used to actually feeling powerful. 

Powerful was a feeling that he liked, and he wanted more of it. 

He sat down on the throne, and he had a feeling that this was who he was meant to be. This was who he really was. This was where he belonged. And the most invigorating feeling was that, more than anything, he wasn't  _afraid_ anymore. Wasn't  _that_ a feeling? 

"I trust you," he said, leaning towards Aria and Harry. "To be my enforcers. In the absence of the...previous enforcers for our previous mad despot."

Aria knelt in that moment, as did Harry. Michael spoke. "You don't need to kneel. You've come this far with me. And I doubt that I could have done all of this without you. Let's make Arachne a better place, shall we?"

"Yes. My Lord."

And that title sank in more than anything else. It sank in, and it emphasized how far they had all come. They weren't nobodies anymore, trying to scavenge off the streets. They were warriors, conquering heroes. And nothing could stand in their way. Any enemy who dared -- any enemy who tried -- would burn, and they would burn horribly. Never again would any one of them be subjected to humiliation, attempted violation, starvation, anything like that. 

They were strong now. 

And even as Michael smiled faintly, he had a feeling that they would always be. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> Spotify Playlist [ here. ](https://open.spotify.com/user/225q7vws6eqfggri22vzogtsq/playlist/2xajDqEHA5aNuOI3aEFyp4?si=EP069sRjSWeWZbWAUKyx3A)


End file.
